Thursday, March 8, 2007

How to Really Annoy your Web Site Visitors

It is quite easy to build a web site. It is even easier to really annoy your web site visitors.

Build A Winner

Anyone can build a web site. Building a good web site is another story. Web designers can easily avoid some of the most common mistakes by watching out for the following pitfalls:

1. Pop-Ups – Pop-ups can really annoy a visitor as these advertisements that open automatically in a new window can be quite distracting. The visitor might be interested in looking at the content of your site but a pop-up can force the visitor to focus on other things. A better way to annoy visitors is by having pop-ups that spawn more pop-ups when the visitor tries to close the first one.

2. Never Ending Web Pages – Another way to annoy your web site visitors is by putting mass amounts of information on one long continuous page. The visitor will keep scrolling endlessly down the web page only to get lost in web site content unrelated to what he or she was looking for in the first place. Long pages are one of the easiest ways to make a web page look hokey. It is much better to keep web site pages short and sweet so that it is easy for the visitor to get right to the information that is being looked for.

3. Excessive use of Graphics – Some web developers think that by using flashy graphics they can attract visitors to their site. Instead, the visitors are likely to get irritated. Too many graphics will make your web site download very slowly. Due to slow download speeds people might leave your web site before even knowing what your site has to offer. In this fast moving world, nobody has spare time to sit and wait until your web site pages load. This is particularly true for the 42 percent of people still on dial-up.

4. Under Construction Pages – Another way to irritate your web site visitors is by diverting them to a page which reads “under construction”. Most people try to find content oriented web sites and if they come across your web page that reads "under construction," the visitor is likely to be annoyed, having spent time getting there with no positive result.

5. Plug-Ins – Some web sites use plug-ins that visitors have to install before they can view the web site. This is one of the easiest way to really annoy your web site visitors. Some people feel that if they like a particular program then others should like it as well. A web developer might like a good-looking icon program which needs to be installed before his or her web site can be viewed. If the program is obscure and not used by most people, this will only be a source of discontent when things do not work properly on the site. Don’t make people download software to see your site. Never ever make them take extra steps to do something.

6. Lack of Content – Most people like content oriented web sites that give information on specific topics. Even search engines love content-based web sites and will rank content heavy sites higher in search results. Usually people visit a web site to see what benefit the site can offer them. Lack of proper content results in annoyed visitors leaving the web site.

7. Music – A few years back music was quite common on the web and many web sites had music that automatically played. Gradually people have realized that music creates a lot of distraction and is a nuisance to a lot of people. If you really want music then a choice should be given to the visitor to switch it on or off. Remember, may people surf the web with music playing already or while sitting in their office. When a web site automatically plays music, it will aggravate them to no end.

8. Inconsistent Page Design – Some sites are designed in such a way that after moving from one page to another the visitor feels as if he or she has come to a totally different web site. There should be some uniformity in page design or else visitors will feel lost and disoriented.

By paying close attention to factors that can annoy web site visitors, web site owners and designers can keep their visitors happy. Following, or rather not following, these eight web site annoyances, webmasters can make the most of each web visitor.